1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an information processing system and an information processing method which, in a network environment, manages devices, such as a printer, a copying machine, and a multi-functional peripheral obtained by integrating the printer and copying machine, connected to a network.
2. Description of the Related Art
A polling technique is a general technique of monitoring the status of a device and acquiring some information from the device. When this polling technique is used, an application operating on a host computer periodically acquires status information from a device, changes the contents of display to the application user on the basis of the status information, and determines execution of the application itself.
When execution of the application is determined, the device executes an operation in response to a request from the application. For example, a device waiting in a power-saving mode (also called “sleep mode”) proceeds to a state (normal operation mode) in which a normal operation is possible. The normal operation herein mentioned is an operation mode which operates an unit that exchanges various kinds of information (e.g., information including PDL and various kinds of status information) with an external apparatus.
Patent reference 1 (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2002-287936) discloses an arrangement which uses a substitute means of a device to be processed if the device is in the sleep mode. However, if a device proceeds from the sleep mode to the normal operation mode by frequent access by an application, the device requires an elapse of a predetermined period to return to the sleep mode, examples of which are indicated in (1) and (2) below.
(1) There is no operation on an operation panel of the device for a predetermined period.
(2) There is no access to the device across a network for a predetermined period.
That is, frequent access by an application makes it impossible to obtain a satisfactory power-saving effect. If access to a device is totally restricted in order to change the status from the normal operation mode to the sleep mode, the user-friendliness decreases.
Also, the arrangement in patent reference 1 uses a device substitute means. In this case, it is necessary to determine whether a device to be processed is in the sleep mode, and this complicates the process in the system.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an information processing technique capable of suppressing the power consumption of a device by a simple process without decreasing the user-friendliness.